The present invention relates to an electronic apparatus equipped with a touch sensor and a method of operating an electronic apparatus through a touch sensor.
One type of electronic apparatus widely spread is an electronic apparatus that is operated through a touch sensor.
An advantage of an electronic apparatus equipped with a touch sensor or a method of operating an electronic apparatus through a touch sensor is that several functions can be allocated to several zones of the sensing area of the touch sensor.
Nevertheless, a touch sensor could cause misoperation of such an electronic apparatus due to user's unintentional touch of an undesired zone of the sensing area of the touch sensor.
One method of preventing such misoperation of an electronic apparatus through a touch sensor is disclosed in Japanese Un-examined Patent Publication No. 11 (1999)-175212. Provided on a touch panel are a first zone for selecting a button and a second zone larger than the first zone and provided as surrounding the first zone. Both zones are provided for each button on the touch panel. Once a user touches the first zone, the button selected through this first zone is continuously selected as long as the user's finger is located within the second zone.
The misoperation prevention method described above is, however, disadvantageous in use of an imaging apparatus equipped with a touch-panel sensor, particularly, when a user operates the imaging apparatus while he or she is watching a target object or an image of the target on a monitor screen without watching the touch-panel sensor. It could happen that the user unintentionally shifts his or her finger from a touched zone to another undesired zone on the touch-panel sensor (from the first zone to another zone beyond the second zone in the misoperation prevention method described above) while touching the touch-panel sensor to operate the imaging apparatus. Such an unintentional finger shift causes un-intentional operation or misoperation of the imaging apparatus.